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Former activist lawyer to head new peace panel


President Benigno Aquino III has appointed a former activist and human rights lawyer as head of the government panel in the peace negotiations with the communist-led National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP). Aquino named Health undersecretary Alexander Padilla as the head of the new peace panel representing the Government of the Republic of the Philippines (GRP), Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process Teresita Quintos-Deles said Thursday. Rights advocates Pablito Sanidad Sr., Maria Lourdes Tison, Ednar Gempasaw Dayanghirang and Jurgette Honculada were named members of the panel, Deles said. Dayanghirang is a Mandaya from Davao and an advocate of indigenous peoples' rights; Sanidad is a human rights lawyer from Baguio City; Honculada is a gender and labor rights advocate from Zamboanga; and Tison is a peace and environment advocate from Negros. Deles praised the group as having a "geographical, gender and age balance" in terms of representation and said the creation of the new panel manifests the Aquino government’s commitment to pursue and achieve a peaceful and just settlement of the 41-year old insurgency. The NDFP is the umbrella group of rebel organizations led by the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) and New People's Army (NPA) that has waged Asia's longest running insurgency. “The President’s designation of Padilla as the government’s chief negotiator in pursuing peace with the CPP-NPA-NDF signals his resolve to restart a peace process aimed to address the root causes of the armed conflict and forge a political settlement," she added. Deles said Padilla’s designation as panel chief “is expected to advance the stalled peace talks" to “a discussion of substantive socio-economic reforms, political and constitutional reforms and the disposition of forces, end the hostilities, and forge a final political settlement of the conflict that will lead to key societal reforms." No date has been set for the resumption of the talks, but Padilla said he is hoping that it would be resumed before the year’s end. The president has also directed the panel to pursue a “time-bound and agenda-bound peace negotiations" based on peace, justice and human rights, Deles said. Negotiations would also be done in consultation with the affected communities, sectors and stakeholders, she added. The government of Norway, which had allowed the use of its facilities in earlier rounds of talks, would remain the third-party facilitator of the GRP-NDF peace talks. No demand for a ceasefire Both Deles and Padilla said that no preconditions were set for the resumption of peace negotiations, which bogged down in 2004 after the NDFP postponed scheduled talks when the United States and the European Union listed the CPP-NPA as a foreign terrorist organization. The government is not demanding for a ceasefire as a precondition for the talks, but Padilla and Deles both expressed hopes for a reduction of violence, saying this would be conducive to the talks. According to Deles, the President said that “violence was a serious concern" that needed to be “put on the table" because “it would be difficult to talk while we are shooting at each other." An alternative mechanism that would lessen the violence would be drawn up by the two sides, he said. Prominent social activists Padilla, a prominent human rights lawyer during the Marcos era, has been in government for the last 24 years. He has previously served as Customs Commissioner, Interior and Local Governments Assistant Secretary, DOH Assistant Secretary for Legal Affairs, Special Prosecutor of the Office of the Ombudsman, Senior State Prosecutor of the justice department, and most recently, Undersecretary of Health. Sanidad is one of the founders of the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG) and a board member of both the Task Force Detainees of the Philippines (TFDP) and the Geneva-based Center for the Independence of Judges and Lawyers of the International Commission of Jurists. One of the private prosecutors in the impeachment trial of former President Joseph Estrada, he served as vice governor of Ilocos Sur in 1972 and deputy minister of the labor department in 1986. He also chaired the Philippine government panel in the Philippines-United States Joint Labor Committee on the US Bases, and was elected chairman of the Singapore-based Regional Council for Human Rights in Asia in 1988. Tison, a native of Negros Occidental, was the private sector representative to the Government Panel that reviewed the peace agreement with the Rebolusyonaryong Partido ng Manggagawa-Mindanao (RPMM) in 2001. Dayanghirang is the Chairman and Executive Director of the Coalition of Mindanao Indigenous People for Peace Advocacy (COMIPPA) and Executive Director of the Mindanao Business Council. Honculada, General Secretary of the National Federation of Labor (Phils), is the former head of the Women’s Action Network for Development and Vice Chairperson of the feminist group PILIPINA. She also represented the women’s sector in the anti-poverty commission of the former Ramos administration.—DM/JV/HS, GMANews.TV

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